Am I Allowed To Be A Feminist?
As a trans woman I’m rejected by — while also living within the boundaries of — cisgender gatekeepers
fem·i·nism /ˈfeməˌnizəm/ noun: the advocacy of women’s rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes.
fem·i·nist /ˈfemənəst/ noun: a person who supports feminism.
Due to an unusual set of circumstances, I have been forced to live my life as a gender amphibian trying to straddle two worlds and survive. As a baby boomer I was indoctrinated to believe that there were only two genders, and that sex and gender were indistinguishable. Because of that narrow definition, no words or language existed to help me understand the very awkward sensation I carried inside my head from my earliest childhood, that I just never felt right. The strength of my binary-defined world was so strong, I simply accepted that whatever my thoughts were, they were wrong.
How could I have such a strong connection with the female spirit around me, yet be so defined by my sex assigned at birth and its associated gender role which was reinforced by the society I grew up in?
All my life I always felt a deep bond with things considered feminine. I always kept it to myself in order to survive but it was a struggle to hold back my thoughts. I would filter my words and reduce the intensity of my emotions in order for them to be acceptable with the people that I socialized with.
I have always been a closet feminist. What right did I have to declare this publicly as an upper-middle class, white, American male — the poster child of privilege?
I just also happen to be transgender: I have male genitalia and a body flooded with testosterone, but a brain that’s wired female. But it seems I have no rights to scream the anger I’ve always felt at the gross mistreatment of women on a global level. I have felt that rage all my life and I have always connected with the frustration and the pain. Yet whenever I let any of those thoughts out in public dialogue among other women, there is always a momentary pause and a silent rebuke that seems to say, “What do you know? You’re a guy.”
It feels like the same rejection I would feel if I tried to say that I know what the pain of monthly cramps or childbirth was like. I am not entitled to identify with women and share their righteous anger; my genitalia and male upbringing disqualify me. But what about my brain, and with it, my heart and soul? Do I get a pass for the essence of who I am?
Imagine for a moment what you would be like if you were raised your entire life in the sex that was the complete opposite of your genitalia; taught and socialized in a gender role the complete opposite of your gender identity; you were only allowed to express who everyone else wanted you to be; and you never, ever had the freedom to express who you actually were?
That is what being transgender is like, complete social rejection of who you really are.
I despise that rejection, yet I live within the boundaries that the straight, gay and lesbian cisgender people have locked me into. I want my feminist anger to be expressed with the same intensity that I feel.
Please don’t demand a membership card for how I feel. I am tired of asking for permission.
I have a right to it.
Writers note: If you have read any of my writings on Medium you will have noticed a definite theme: the incredible pain of gender dysphoria and all the difficult aspects of just being transgender.
My writing has three specific goals:
1. Writing is my therapy. I have a very limited outlet for my thoughts so I write to find a way to process the most profound experience in my life. I need to understand and accept myself to move forward.
2. Being transgender, for me, is a very lonely existence and if I can share some of the things that I feel and think as I go through the process of transitioning with others who are transgender, and, in some way, lessen their pain and sense of loneliness, then all of this public exposure of my personal thoughts is not a waste.
3. I write to help cisgender people understand that all trans people want is to be simply understood, accepted, and treated as a normal person. Because we are.
Thank you for reading my work.
